Samuel W. Hayes. Prominent
among those who have wielded large and beneficent influence in the
affairs of the vital young commonwealth of Oklahoma is Judge Samuel
Walter Hayes, who was a member of the state constitutional
convention, and who retired, in the spring of 1914, from the office of
chief justice of the Supreme Court of the state to become a
candidate, in the primary election, for representative of Oklahoma in
the United States Senate, but who met defeat in the primaries, though
he received strong and representative support. The judge has resumed
the private practice of his profession, in Oklahoma City, and has
been a representative member of the bar of Oklahoma from the
territorial epoch.

Judge Hayes was born
at Huntsville, the judicial center of Madison County, Arkansas, on
the 17th of September, 1875, and he is a son of John and Mollie (Cox)
Hayes, the former a native of Tennessee and the latter of Missouri.
In 1877 the family removed to Texas, where the father continued to be
successfully identified with agricultural pursuits until 1912, when
he came to Oklahoma, where he and his wife still maintain their
residence and where he is now living virtually retired.

The public schools
of the Lone Star State afforded to Judge Hayes his early educational
discipline, and later he pursued a higher course of study in the
historic old University of Virginia, at Charlottesville. In 1897,
shortly after attaining to his legal majority, Judge Hayes came to
Oklahoma Territory, and at Ryan he began the study of law in the
office of a representative member of the territorial bar. He made
substantial progress in his assimilation of the involved science of
jurisprudence and in 1899 he was duly admitted to the bar. He
forthwith engaged in the practice of his profession at Ryan, where he
formed a partnership with Eugene E. Morris, under the firm name of
Morris & Hayes.
This effective alliance continued until 1902, when Judge Hayes
removed to Chickasha, where he became junior member of the law firm
of Welborne &Hayes.
There he continued in the successful practice of his profession until
1907, when he was elected a justice of the Supreme Court of the
state, which was admitted to the Union in that year. He continued his
able services on the Supreme Bench until his resignation, in April,
1914, as previously intimated, and from 1913 until his retirement he
was chief justice of this important tribunal, in the formulating
and dispensation of
whose functions he played an influential part, his record in this
important office now constituting an integral part of the history of
Oklahoma jurisprudence. While engaged in practice at Ryan Judge Hayes
was elected the first city attorney of that thriving municipality, in
1900. The Judge is identified with the American Bar Association and
is also an active and valued member of both the Oklahoma State Bar
Association and the Oklahoma County Bar Association.

Judge Hayes has been
one of the influential and resourceful representatives of the
democratic party in Oklahoma and has been active in political affairs
under both territorial and state government. He was a delegate to the
state constitutional convention of Oklahoma, in 1906, as
representative of the Chickasha district,
and he wielded much influence in the deliberations and work of that
historic assembly, in which he served as chairman of the legal
advisory committee and the committee on schedules, besides being a
member of the important judiciary committee and that on Federal
relations. In this connection it is probable that his most important
service to the new commonwealth was rendered when he was selected,
with Walter A. Ledbetter and Charles Moore, by the members of the
constitutional convention and prominent citizens of the state and who
went, in the recess of the convention, to the City of Washington, D.
C., where they obtained an interview with President Roosevelt and
also United States Attorney General Bonaparte, the latter having not
been at the time in favor of granting statehood to Oklahoma. The
committee presented its case vigorously both to the President and the
attorney general and obtained their opinions as to the provisions
that should be made for the constitution of Oklahoma to secure
favorable action on the part of the President. The committee then
returned to Oklahoma and in the constitutional convention so
effectively presented their ideas and those of the officials at
Washington that a constitution was framed in such a way that
President Roosevelt could consistently do nothing else than issue his
proclamation in favor of the admission of Oklahoma to the Union.
Since the admission of the state Judge Hayes has been most loyal and
zealous in his efforts to forward the interests of the new
commonwealth and to make its governmental basis secure and steadfast.

In a fraternal way
Judge Hayes is identified with the lodge and chapter bodies of York
Rite Masonry and with the Knights of Pythias. He is a member of the
Oklahoma City Country Club and the Oklahoma City Men’s Dinner Club,
and both he and his wife hold membership in the Methodist Episcopal
Church. As a representative of his profession the Judge delivers an
annual lecture in the law department of ’the University of Oklahoma.

On the 8th of
October, 1899, Judge Hayes wedded Miss Ida Poole, daughter of Thomas
F. and Margaret Poole, of Ryan, this state, and she was summoned to
the life eternal on the 24th of March. 1910, being survived by three
children,–Kenton B., Ruby and Ida, all of whom remain at the
paternal home. In June, 1912, was solemnized the marriage of Judge
Hayes to Miss Mamie McColloch, who was born in the State of Tennessee
and who at the time of her marriage was in charge of the department
of English in the Northwestern Normal School of Oklahoma, at Alva. In
Oklahoma City the family home is at 924 West Nineteenth Street.